1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to telecommunications in general, and, more particularly, to a wireless telecommunications system.
2. Description of Related Art
FIG. 1 depicts a schematic diagram of a portion of a known wireless telecommunications system, providing wireless telecommunications service to a number of wireless mobile units (e.g., wireless mobile units 101-1 through 101-3) that are situated within a geographic region. The heart of a typical wireless telecommunications system is a wireless switching center (xe2x80x9cWSCxe2x80x9d) 120. Typically, the WSC 120 is connected to a plurality of base stations (e.g., base stations 103-1 through 103-5) that are dispersed throughout the geographic region serviced by the system and to the local and long-distance telephone and data networks (e.g., local-office 130, local-office 138 and toll-office 140). WSC 120 is responsible for, among other things, establishing and maintaining a call between a first wireless mobile unit and a second wireless mobile unit or, alternatively, between a wireless mobile unit and a wireline mobile unit (e.g., wireless mobile unit 150), which is connected to the system via the local and/or long-distance networks.
The geographic region serviced by a wireless telecommunications system is partitioned into a number of spatially distinct areas called xe2x80x9ccells.xe2x80x9d As depicted in FIG. 1, each cell is schematically represented by a hexagon. In practice, however, each cell has an irregular shape that depends on the topography of the terrain surrounding the cell. Typically, each cell contains a base station, which comprises the radios and antennas that the base station uses to communicate with wireless mobile units in that cell and also comprises the transmission equipment that the base station uses to communicate with the WSC 120. However, locating wireless mobile units within a cell was often difficult.
Recently, global position systems (GPS) have been developed to the point where they are very cheap to implement. Thus, such systems may soon be prevalent in wireless mobile units to determine precise location thereof. In addition, in the area of wireless technology, assisted GPS is being developed to improve on normal GPS for position or location detection in wireless mobile units. Further, other known systems already exists (such as known triangulation methods) for precisely locating wireless mobile units. And still others are constantly being developed. Therefore, a need exists to create other uses for the location or position information of wireless mobile units.
Increasingly complex modem life leaves many people eager for means of simplifying their busy lives. Moreover, there is a tendency to enjoy automating even simple tasks-like automatic opening of garage doors. More and more, such automation is finding its way into homes and offices today. Actions such as turning on lights, ovens, heating/cooling systems, etc. are often done automatically in homes. Familiar systems like these are time based, i.e., based on times of the day. However, as people arrive in their homes at varying times due to irregular work hours, or arrive in their offices at varying times due to irregular home hours, a need exists for automating actions based on something other than time.
The present invention is directed to a wireless telecommunications system that uses location or position information to initiate actions on behalf of travelers. As position information is received, it is compared to position information of a remote location, such as a home. As the traveler approaches his home, and gets within a certain distance of home, a signal is then sent to a controller within his home to perform an action or instruct an action. These actions can include varying temperature within the home, for example.